THE NIGHTMARE STONE Page 4

  John cleared his throat, suddenly aware that the conversation seemed to be turning towards when they were moving in, rather than if. He looked at Emma and Sophie. They were both staring at him.

  'Mrs Simpson,' he said, 'I just want to say you have a lovely house here. It really is amazing and the gardens are just stunning. It's certainly given us plenty to think about.'

  She waved him away impatiently.

  'Nonsense, Mr Harris. You and I both know this place is exactly what you're looking for. There isn't another property like it within twenty miles so don't feel you have to pretend on my account. Unless you're here because you have nothing better to do than to waste my time, I can assume you have the funds to buy a house at this price. I pride myself on being a good judge of character, and I do not sense any mischief in any of you.'

  There was no sensible way to answer. If he looked at Emma, John didn't think he would be able to stop himself smiling. Mrs Simpson was certainly different.

  'I'm what you would call no-nonsense,' she continued to her captive audience. 'I understand you will want to change things and modernise, do things your own way. I won't be in the slightest offended.'

  John sipped at his tea, uncertain what to say. It was true that he had fallen in love with the house and he knew that Emma felt the same. Yet it seemed that this strange old lady had made the decision already that they were going to buy it, as if it had nothing to do with them. He chanced a glance at Emma. She was staring out of a window, watching the river flow past in the distance. Meanwhile, Sophie was tucking into one ginger biscuit after another.

  He looked back at Mrs Simpson.

  'I hope you don't mind me saying this, but it has felt a bit like an interview. To see if you want to sell the house to us, I mean. I'm sorry, that sounded rude. But I'm sure you know what I mean.'

  'When you get to my age, Mr Harris, you realise you don't have the luxury of taking your time over decisions. Of course this is about whether I like you. I won't sell to someone I don't like. And I do like you, if you wish to know. I like you all. You seem perfectly charming people and I would be happy to see you living here.' She paused for effect. 'If you decide to make me an offer, of course.'

  John nodded, leaving her words hanging between them. They chatted for a few more minutes, small talk about the grounds and the river beyond, then Richard returned, coughing quietly. It was time for them to leave. They all shook hands with Mrs Simpson who apologised for not showing them out. She had settled herself into the sofa and did not show any intention of moving for a while.

  When they were outside they thanked Richard for his time. He looked quite stunned, as if he wasn't sure exactly what had just happened.

  'She's...unusual, Richard,' John said as they walked back to their cars.

  'She's that. I don't think I've ever met anyone like her before. I'm sorry it was a bit of an inquisition. As far as I'm concerned, you take your time and let me know what you think about the place. You've got the brochure.'

  They watched him drive off then stood on the gravel looking back up at the house. It was so beautiful, so incredibly beautiful. John tried to imagine the reality of living in such a place, the work he could do here to create something unique. He glanced at the upstairs windows as Emma and Sophie climbed into the car.

  He froze. There was a face at one of the attic windows. He stared for a few moments, trying to get a clearer look. But the sun disappeared behind a cloud and the shadows and reflections were gone. The window was empty, just a dark square against the tiles of the roof. He felt his head swim again, just as when he had seen Mrs Simpson for the first time.

  The face had been small, pale. The face of a child. The face of a boy who John could still picture in his mind as clearly as if he had seen him just five minutes ago. The face of Adam, his dead brother.

  SIX

  Sophie had chatted all the way home, excited about the house and the grounds. Emma was quieter. She looked at John a few times as they drove along. He had sat in the car for a while before starting the engine, letting the nausea settle. Emma had noticed and raised an eyebrow, asking him without speaking. He had nodded gently, an almost imperceptible movement of his head.

  Yes, the nod meant. Another flashback. Another visit from the past to spoil a perfect day.

  They spoke about things that evening, after they had eaten. Emma started by asking where John had seen his brother. When he told her, she looked down at the carpet and sighed.

  Let him go, John knew she was thinking. Please God let them all go.

  As if it was that easy to forget what had happened all those years ago. To forget the horror of watching his home burn in front of him, knowing that his family was also burning.

  The flashbacks had started in his teens. Up until that point he had managed to push the past down into a darker place, a place where it could not reach out and hurt him. There were dreams, of course, usually muddled ones where John was with his parents and then he could not find them. Sometimes there was fire but not always. More often, he would just dream that he was lost.

  Then he saw his brother for the first time. He had just left his grandparents' home for university, eighteen and full of excitement. The endless parties and alcohol were a challenge but he was young and could cope. Until the morning he woke with a terrible hangover and opened the curtains of his room at the Halls of Residence.

  He had looked up, feeling the sharp stabs of pain behind his eyeballs as he did so, and had fallen backwards as he saw Adam staring down at him from one of the other windows opposite to his own. He had vomited and retched before risking another look. There was nothing there, just a dirty window and brown standard curtains, partially closed. John stared at the window for ages but his brother's face did not reappear; so the pattern was set.

  From time to time, usually when he least expected it or had not thought of his family for a while, then the past would intrude with a jolt from nowhere and he would see his brother. He had seen him in countless places over the years – reflected in windows, bus stops, aeroplane windows on night flights. Sometimes he caught him staring from cars as they sped past. Once, John had fallen asleep late at night whilst watching a film. He had come to and seen Adam on the screen, walking towards him before the image disappeared and the film returned as if nothing had been there.

  Which was the truth, John told himself every time. There was nobody there. No dead brother. No ghost come back to haunt him for his cowardice. Just a trick of his brain when he was tired or stressed. Just a guilty fuse that was easily tripped. Emma took to calling them his 'flashbacks', an old memory triggered for no apparent reason. Nothing that could hurt him, just unpleasant when it happened. That had become their name for it – flashback. Another visit from a long gone past, from something that had happened and could never be changed.

  Seeing his brother at Sycamores did not bother John. He loved the place and knew he wanted to buy it. If his mind wanted to throw a cog as he stood outside the place, what could he do about it? He expected he would see Adam at the window again. Or maybe in the drawing room. Or perhaps staring up at him from the bottom of the bloody river when he was feeding the ducks.

  John did not usually tell Emma when he had a flashback. There was no point. Adam was there and then he was gone, and the day moved on. But if she noticed him go quiet, or grow a little paler, then she would lay a hand on his arm and raise her eyebrows; he would nod, and nothing more would be said. Their own private question-and-answer method of dealing with it.

  That evening, as music played and wine disappeared from the bottle, they spoke about the house and Mrs Simpson. Definitely a one-off, they agreed. An old fashioned eccentric, incredible for her age. But strangely likeable, and Sophie had seemed to take an immediate shine to her.

  By the time the bottle was empty and they were cuddled sleepily on the sofa, they had decided to buy Sycamores.

  An offer was placed and accepted. It would be a quick process as they did not have to wait to sell their house and Mrs Simpson was able to buy the bungalow that she wanted. John and Emma decided to press on with the work at the house before they moved in so that the disruption would be less. Also, it was impractical to take Sophie out of school with just a few months of the academic year left.

  Contracts were exchanged and Sycamores belonged to them, for cash. John and Emma visited the house again; Emma chose the furniture she wanted to keep. Mrs Simpson shuffled around after her whilst John waited in the drawing room, trying hard to comprehend what was happening. There was the obligatory tea and biscuits; they spoke about the house, its history.

  Then Mrs Simpson was gone, moved to her new house without fanfare or fuss. They received a call from Richard the estate agent, informing them that the keys were theirs and he would be pleased to meet them at the house.

  I bet he's pleased, John had chuckled. His commission would be enough to please anybody.

  He visited the house frequently. It became a day and night all-consuming passion for them both. He brought in the best contractors he could find and they worked at speed, pleased to have such a lucrative commission in the economic climate. Walls were stripped bare and re-plastered. The whole house was rewired with state of the art electronics throughout. The kitchen was a source of particular pride; two big skylights were added that flooded the huge space with natural light and a breathtaking view of the sky above.

  Sophie's bedroom was decorated to her choice. She told her parents that she would see the house again when it was finished. She wanted it to be a surprise. Throughout the early summer months the work went on at a feverish pace. John amended the specification as the development proceeded; he was invigorated by the financial freedom that the money gave him and he allowed his imagination to take over. Part of the basement
was converted into a cinema and games room. When it was finished, he allowed himself the luxury of sitting alone in the near dark to watch one of his favourite films on a screen that filled an entire wall. When life has become surreal, he reasoned, don't try and make sense of it. He was determined to enjoy the ride.

  And then it was finished. The contractors were off site. The outer brickwork had been cleaned, the windows replaced. The ivy was cleaned off the chimneys and the gable ends repaired. Sycamores had become a stunning fusion of period beauty and modern quality. And on a beautiful July day, as the sun streamed down through the trees and cast a warm glow over their home, John, Emma and Sophie stood on the gravel drive before opening the door and walking in.

  SEVEN

  A month went by, like a high cloud racing across a clear sky. Sophie settled in quickly, the way that children do when confronted by change. The weather was fine, there was plenty to do around the gardens and grounds. Emma had given John and Sophie increasing amounts to do, starting with simple tidying up and bonfire building, then slowly increasing in complexity, and now they were in competition with each other as to whose bean canes were tied the best, which tomatoes would be the biggest, how many potatoes would be dug up from each deep pot on the slabs outside the orangery. The trees whispered above them in a never ending angel's song. Gradually, step by gentle step, the garden was returning to its origins.

  There was something that nagged at John, though. He thought back to the day they moved in, the shadow on the stairs. It was already like a dream that couldn't quite be recalled. Part of him wondered if he had actually seen it; another part whispered to him that he had, that the shadow really had followed them up the stairs from the door.

  Just another flashback, John told himself. Nothing more than that.

  But the nagging feeling would not go away.

  The old library was John's favourite space; after spending millions on the house, he found that he was most comfortable just retreating there amongst the books, papers and documents. It was a treasure trove that would take ten lifetimes to sort. John had not renovated the room; it had been left as it was when the old lady had lived here, his lasting tribute to her years at Sycamores. He loved the room, with its dark oak panelling and floor, the huge mahogany desk that had cost him five hundred pounds (he had managed to convince Mrs Simpson to take that much; she would have settled for three hundred) and the endless rows of shelving that held over a hundred years' worth of book collecting.

  John found Emma in there one day in late August. He wandered into the library just as she emerged sneezing and dirty, clutching a large leather wallet that had been at the bottom of an old box. A paper label had been stuck to the front of the wallet and on it was written 'Sycamores – a vision of its place in nature' in faded copperplate.

  John helped her lift the papers out. They were musty and curled but in fantastic condition considering their age. They were dated 1901 and showed in breathtaking detail how the gardens were envisaged. There were plan drawings in various scales together with pencil sketches of views from the drawing room, bedroom windows and from the sycamores back up to the house. They both smiled at a drawing that showed great mature trees casting long evening shadows over the driveway. Someone had scribbled 'perhaps to attain such a height over a period of some fifty years' at the bottom of the image.

  The great sycamores must have been youthful then, one hundred and ten years ago. Now, their huge gnarled branches arched over the drive, like old men leaning forwards to sip at their beer. John could already imagine the wonderful autumn colours that would emerge in a few weeks. Whenever he drove through the gates and saw the house through the natural frame of the trunks he slowed down a little, just to savour the view.

  The old plans became Emma's obsession. She spent hours looking at them. John would walk up behind her and stroke her hair, maybe kiss the warm patch of skin under her ear. He enjoyed the soft moan that his kiss might elicit, then he would ask her what she had found.

  She traced a finger over the old paper to show him the discoveries of the day – an old wall that could be restored, a well that was long since silted up and forgotten. He listened to her enthusiastic chatter with growing wonder; he had not seen this side of her for years. This was the Emma he had fallen in love with, the girl who had walked on high walls when drunk, who had bungee-jumped on their honeymoon whilst he stood back in blunt refusal.

  Her natural sense of inquisitiveness was back and John revelled in her happiness. Sophie picked up on it as well. She seemed to blossom every day as she spent time with her mother, researching the gardens and beyond. She learned from the old books that she spent time reading. She had quickly become an expert on their new home.

  But she grew increasingly frustrated at her inability to find out about the previous occupants of Sycamores. Mrs Simpson had once hinted at family archives but there were none to be found in the library and all the other rooms had been gutted and modernised.

  'Go and see her. Ask her,' John suggested one afternoon when he was walking around the perimeter of the grounds with Sophie next to him. He scraped at the lush grass as they walked. Sophie reached down to pick daisies and then put them into a basket she had found in one of the abandoned outhouses by the river.

  'Will you come with me?'

  'Of course I will. I'm sure she'll be glad to see you. She really likes you.'

  'She's funny. I mean, she's really old and everything, but she's really easy to talk to. Like someone younger.'

  John chuckled. 'I think she's still younger, deep down. Just because she looks old and frail doesn't mean her brain isn't still the same. You can talk to her just like you would anybody else. She could teach you so much about this place, before it's lost forever.'

  'What do you mean?'

  'Well, Sophie, one day she'll pass away and then all the memories will go with her. She hasn't got any family. We're the last link with her past, living in this house. We should go and talk to her.

  EIGHT

  They called to see Mrs Simpson the next day. Emma was busy in the gardens planning a new water feature, so she stayed behind to carry on. She made John promise to find out about the old stone in the walled garden. It was on her hit-list for replacement, but first she needed to know about its significance.

  They did not let her know they were coming. Sophie baked some cakes to take and she carried them carefully in a Tupperware container. It was a short walk to the bungalow, just down the driveway and up to the main road into the village, then along past the church. John rested a hand on his daughter's shoulder as they waited for Mrs Simpson to come to the door. She shuffled towards the obscured glazing and opened the door with some difficulty.

  She had aged since John had seen her last. Her skin seemed tighter, more drawn over her cheekbones. Her lips were drawn and she rested heavily on her stick. Yet her eyes burned as fiercely as ever and when she saw them, a slow smile spread across her face.

  'Mr Harris. Sophie. What an unexpected pleasure. Do come in.'

  She moved awkwardly away from the door so that they could enter the narrow hall.

  'I'm sorry that the surroundings are less grand than when I first met you. However, those days are gone for me now. You are the new Lord and Ladies of the Manor and I'm just the lowly serf on the edge of your kingdom.'

  There was no bitterness or sarcasm in her voice, just a stark appraisal of the reality. It was true, thought John. For more than fifty years this woman ruled supreme over the house, the grounds and probably half the damn village. Now she's here, just a shadow of what she was. He paused to allow Sophie to go in first then he followed them both slowly down the hall towards the living room. I know virtually nothing about you, he mused as he stared at Mrs Simpson's hunched back. A whole life led, and I don't know any of it.

  They were seated on two armchairs and an offer of tea was made. John said that he would make it and Mrs Simpson was happy to let him. When he returned from the kitchen, he found Sophie and the old lady chatting.